Freddy could only advise them to return to the illegal 5 meter whole they were extracting the stones from and cover it again. He had to get back to the station to inform his superiors about this issue and wait for further and accurate instructions. Read the rest of this entry »

This fragile ecosystem holds one of the biggest biodiversity inside Bolivian soil and is also one of the most endangered ecosystems in the world. Its vastness covers from highly dry zones to large wetlands which represents the source of life, food and spirituality for the Guaraní-Isoseño people. Read the rest of this entry »

Mr Daniel Arce is one of the most prominent cow breeder in the country, he has not the profile of an alternative mind that is constantly looking to do things contrary to the mainstream; all the opposite. But since two years ago he got in contact with the concept of permaculture and he was amazed by the possibilities and by the simple, yet holistic and complete, process of creating sustainable habitats. Read the rest of this entry »

Those days along the Pilcomayo River were all together the hottest days I've survived. I’m really happy that I can be here to write about this. Read the rest of this entry »

We don’t express what we feel because we think that what we think is enough to go by and get what we want. And what we want is destroying the planet and ourselves without us being able to see it and to avoid it. Read the rest of this entry »

I will be moving slowly from speaking to gardening and I hope that by the time I am 80 I will only speak beautiful words and say only important and relevant things at the correct moment and with the necessary intention. Read the rest of this entry »

It depends. If we asked our selves: Lets rise our hands if we want to live in a planet where growing our own food is illegal….
Now, rise our hands if we want to live in a planet where growing our own food is basically the only way to survive…

There was this era when images were ruling the planet, and messages triggered our interests and our attention. A time when crowds of people and milliards of eyes looked back to find a lost message, an image or an idea that gives meaning to life. Then Marketing arose. And the meaning of life came in plastic packages. And all turned segmented and every action became measurable. And all sorts of traditional spontaneous stimuli and usages of commerce and production were first dimmed out-cast, then declared illegal. And soon after any thing any body did started to be exact and predictable, but still nothing really inspired anyone.

In the meantime, the brothers and sisters IX March for the TIPNIS camped in La Paz for over two weeks without being received by the government. Instead they were intimidated, water was thrown to them and tear gas to dissipate the crowd gathered close to the main square. The leaders decided to go back to their communities, as they were categorically rejected by the authorities whom were busier organizing the consultation, the same consultation these walkers and heroes wanted to avoid. Because its illegal, because it should be done years ago before the project was signed, because now the whole process lacks of justice and its evident that the official plans for Bolivia do not take into consideration the voices of those who have been systematically ignored for the last hundreds of years.

Because we don’t really see the difference, we can’t find the relation between a lost dog and a missing child. We need to be inspired. Which in the most basic terms is translated into a more conventional form like – What is there for me? Which might be developed into: What do I expect from my inspiration? or How does the thing should go in order that I can call it an inspiration?

Wrong questions. People who are not dragged by a more collective way of organizing and protecting themselves will have a very bad time sooner or later. That is not an inspiration; it’s just an amateur prophecy of what is going on right now.

But the idea is strong. Rise our hands if we are encouraged enough to do what we do for the good of all living beings?

Are we ready to be changed the way we say we all should change?

Community means the good for everyone. There is only as much “I” as I can contribute with for the whole. Mine is the responsibility. We are the only thing we have.

When everybody means, everybody counts. And all would be irreplaceable.

As I write know I read that two of the Brother from the IX March of the Indigenous Peoples of the TINIS have died in a car accident. Some more are injured. News did not speak about this. But social networks do. At that point irreversible, unpreventable and sad. Two lives accidentally gone after the whole column of people confronted the menace of a group in Coroico, who threatened the IX March with not letting them stay the night at their premises. But the comrades arrived and passed the night safely in Yolosa, Municipality of Coroico. The next advanced move ahead was interrupted by a night accident that took two lives and injured 7. Some babies.

Before reading the cold news, I was saying that according to some ancient traditions, the way of communitarian life is the way of human organization that is most adaptive and balanced with Nature, as opposed as the “individualistic” way. And I was thinking that when “I” is too important, “we” no longer exists.

The March continued two days after I left it last Saturday. When I got there, I saw the extension next to the road filled with tents and plastics providing shadow and protection from the heavy sun. Every thing was abrupt and exterior. I was no one who wanted to be some one there. I remained aside for a while, taking some photos from the far. Dust and danger were all over the place. As I took the camera of photos out and took some warming up shots, kids from all ages started to gather around me, shouting and pulling the camera strip or my sleeve down. I turned to make pics from them. A sudden stroke of familiarity ran trough my bones for some seconds, but I didn’t feel that sensation again until the last interviews I shot, the morning after, when I could access into some of the people inside the camping site. Then I left, because they were resting.

The key is that constantly and expressively everyone starts thinking in the whole of the community. Not in ourselves. Not in our families or our properties, but the wellness of all beings instead.

The issue here is that for minds like ours this needs a good deal of disposition, meditation and some other available techniques, but for a daughter of a family that has been raised like that for the past six generations, who looks outside and sees and feels that her neighbor and his neighbor also feel and act the same, for her it is all too easy. She doesn’t even need to think about it. She knows. And under that knowledge, there are innumerable things that are western-logical, which she would never even imagine.

This “Returning to the Earth” thing means a lot more than only getting your hands filth with dust and watch some tomatoes grow. It has to do with behavior, has to do with the simplest understanding of how we interact with each other. It has to do with recognizing the distance between us and do our best to shorten it.

Tonight, some of the few that are still defending their life co-existing with Nature are mourning the souls of two community strugglers. They will be named heroes. They are to become signs and flags. They will arrive in front of their community to the streets of La Paz in a few more days.